knitting for therapy followed by throwing knitting against wall

The new job and the holidays have had me pretty busy and pretty stressed... which means I have knitted a lot of stuff.  When I get this way I tend to knit-binge where I start lots of huge projects that I have no hope of finishing in the next six months but maybe by the time Fall rolls around again.  I'm amazed at how therapeutic it can be though. 

The other thing that happens is I tend to start a project then realize it's not going to work out for whatever reason and I'm stuck with a specific quantity of random yarn.  A perfect example of this is the skein of Plymouth Alpaca Prima fingering weight I picked up in Murfreesboro last summer that just can't seem morph into a decent item.  It's lovely moss green (which I thought would be pretty with my yellow jacket) so I started with a scarf pattern featuring leaves along one edge.  Two lessons learned from this fiasco:

• Alpaca is not good for details.  Leaves knitted in fuzzy yarn just looks like lumpy scallops.   A shame to make all that fuzzy goodness into badness.
• Multiple YO's are my nemesis.  I will find a way to muck it up.  This is a recent development.  I think I have a mental block.

So, I'm going to frog this mother and try something else... something simple and without any freaking lacework or open stuff.  Methinks something with a nice ruffle that won't devolve into epic suck if a little fuzzy.

Happy New Year / My Knitting Resolution

My singular goal for my knitting is simply to finish this dang Jolly Rancher sweater-- and sooner rather than later!  I finished one sleeve over the weekend and did about 30% of the second one so I suppose I'm on track.  In the meantime, I have come to the conclusion that I loath knitting long sleeves and will avoid doing so in the future.  Knitting all these short rows on long circular needles is strangely tedious in ways that knitting the torso is not.  Not to mention, I get overheated sometimes and short-sleeves jobbies are just more comfortable for me.  So, short sleeves it is... as soon as I finish this stupid thing.  Hopefully that will be within the week and I can get on with my life.

For future projects I am considering another "Global Warming" sweater or maybe I'll actually get around to the Buttony.  If I do it, it would be heavily modified with short sleeves and all.

Update

Okay, so 28thirty is more than halfway done.  The body is finished and I just need to go back and finish the sleeves.

I've abandoned the Herringbone Project.  Um, colorwork.  Enough said.  I knitted until my right hand was swollen last night (more on that later.)  Also, I think the Rainbow Shrug broke my brain.  Anything tedious makes me twitch these days.  I just can't.

So anyhoo, to attempt something not unlike Fair Isle in this state of mind and when I have a deadline would just be ridiculous.  This is being replaced by the Fresh Moss bag-- which I can't post about in detail until after October 5th... or whenever it will be gifted.  Maybe sooner.  I made the decision to change so that I would be working with a single color then previously mentioned swelling started.  My hand still hurts.  A row of triple increases nearly breaking my needles from the tension will do that.

the zenith of laziness (as illustrated by my lack of capitol letters)

just realized I have multiple completed projects on which I never bothered to weave in the ends or block.  woopsie.  pretty lame considering all the real work is done and blocking makes a huge difference.  maybe i'll go back to bed.

Emerald Garden Cardigan: Part I

Started Veera Välimäki's "Modern Garden Cardigan" today. I'm using Nashua Handknits Creative Focus Chunky in Emerald.  This is my first project that involved a chart… Um, knitting charts are apparently not like cross-stitch charts. I don’t know why it took 3 tries at row 3 on chart A and then 5 or 6 on row 5 for me to catch on to that little concept. I kept trying to do that first purl on the leaf pattern one stitch before I should because on the chart it looked that way. Ugh...  Once I got it, it became surprisingly easy.

So multiple redo’s and unmeasurable anguish later, I’m on my way with no problems at all. Actually, the tears have dried up and I’m really enjoying this pattern. The yarn is fabulous too. I’m liking the jewel-tone color and the fuzzy goodness.  I spent 2 or 3 hours sorting out the chart issue and now, having spent about that much time since the issue is resolved, I'm about halfway done with the body of the garment.  Should be able to finish sometime this weekend between baking Mocha cake and concert on Sunday.  Yay!

The failure of yarn logic & other fiascos

It may not look like anything wearable but this is the embryonic beginnings of a sweater. You're looking at the front left side. The part at the top is the front of the sleeve. It's not a traditional cardigan. Nay! It's a twisted cardigan! (Mwah ha ha ha!!) The front sections are knitted from the center-out so you have horizontal cables giving it a nice twisted appearance. (And you intentionally drop the purl stitch between the cables for the laddering.) The back is done bottom to top then joined later. And not meant to be worn alone... Um, definitely throw something on underneath.

No, seriously. It will be cool when it's finished. I've done both sides of the front and started the back last night. The pattern calls for bulky weight yarn. Did I go buy bulky weight yarn? No. Why would I do that? That would be following instructions. Next you'll be wanting me to check my gauge and read the pattern exactly too.

Fiasco part I: I bought Malabrigo worsted in Violettas-- a nice inky periwinkle. I personally don't know how Malabrigo worsted is classified as a worsted at all. I think it's heavy worsted at best-- but maybe bulky. So that was my reasoning that got me on the road to knitting a size small, which I would normally wear. Well, apparently my yarn-logic shouldn't have practical use. It was waaay effing small. (That would be because I should have used BULKY yarn and then checked my gauge. DOH!) So, halfway through the left side, I have an intervention with myself and frog the dang thing, starting again with a medium. Medium looks good.

Fiasco part II: After finishing the left, I went to start the right which is identical to the left but reversed. That was when my brain started to skip. I knitted the first five rows just fine then row six nearly caused me to blackout with rage... six times. I had to redo the entire first six rows six times. Add a third-six and you'll start to understand the feeling. The problem was, row 5 was an increase row and 6 was cables. The stitches were just tight enough from the increases (and my gauge tends to be tight-er anyway) that I would start the first cable and (brain skip) the yarn would be just to the tips of the needles to make everything meet and my hands would jump and I would drop about seven stitches in such a way that there was no way I could just pick them up. It was a start over situation every time. Then I got past it by about a dozen rows only to realize I had skimmed over a part of the pattern that was pretty critical (tends to happen when you've just knitted the same rows over and over.) So I had to frog it AGAIN. I'll stop there. I had to go get a glass of wine. The next morning I completed the right side on the first try without a hitch. I hope to God I can finish this without any additional drama...

Badassery is afoot.

okay, I frogged the first one

The laddering and cast on didn't bother me nearly as much as the uneven yo k2tog and also the size. I started it as a medium but it looked really, really big. The new one is a small and is looking worlds better already. I've got the lace pattern corrected and I've got a better handle on the whole dpn thing and it seems to have fixed my laddering issues. Almost to the thumb gusset though and that makes me tres nervous.

Awww, blerg.

I decided to stall on the Buttony sweater and try something easier for my first full sweater. You know. Ease into it. RIGHT.

Since I have a ton of this blueberry alpaca and the pattern was free and I already had the needles I needed, I decided to jump into "Cabled" by Hinke. It looked so forgiving. (Unfortunately, there is much to forgive with me.) To the left is what it SHOULD look like which will make my sweater downright comedic.

It's not a hard pattern but it does need a little finesse. I'm getting to practice my cables and I'm also learning to pick up stitches along the side too. My main issue is you do all these sections and you have to keep all the stitches active-- so you rarely bind off. I have multiple areas tied to scrap yarn until I come back to them but I still have to break the yarn... you know, so I can be knitting somewhere else on this thing. Maybe there are standard ways of handling this stuff of which I am just ignorant.

Anyway, I've finished the front bottom, the straps that everything attaches to and most of one sleeve. I'm trying really hard to stay optimistic. I'm concerned that A) it will not fit (the bottom seems small and the sleeves seem big) and B) it will look so homemade I won't wear it.

I'm admittedly not a good knitter as I've only been at it for a couple of months and there are definite trouble spots that I'm hoping to correct later once the whole things is finished. (Got a crash course in fixing a dropped stitch that fell down about 4 rows last night. This is when it's nice to have a crochet hook handy...)

I really hope this is one of those times when the finished product is far better than the process. Ahhh well. Elizabeth Zimmerman's raglan construction (a la buttony) seems far less intimidating at the moment.